First off, let me confess the real reason why I arrived twenty minutes late for a lunch appointment with my gal pal Kathy. Five minutes of lateness really were due to having taken a wrong turn off Bukit Timah. The other fifteen were the due to my wanting to test drive an all new item of magic underwear that I only just bought.

The item I'm talking about most closely resembled the third picture from the right, and even though I did as I was told and bought a size bigger than I usually wear, turned out to be something of a struggle to get in and out of even so. Something else magic knickers most definitely aren't are garments you want to find yourself having to wriggle in and out of in the midst of company. Do not wear them if you're going to see your doctor. Do wear them if you're intending to try on dresses similar to the one show in the illustration on the right, however. My waist cincher makes a world of difference to this outfit, evening out the lumps and bumps and no VPL at all, zip, nothing whatsoever.

Having said all of that, probably one of the reasons I like the waist cincher so much is because I'm one of those women who doesn't have very much of a natural waist. A somewhat curvier friend tried the same product and compained that the waistband just wouldn't stay put where it's supposed to for some reason.

Items from my real life wardrobe

I can't remember what exactly it was that prompted me to buy my first ever pair of magic knickers from Marks and Spencer. I can remember being astonished to find a) how expensive they were and b) that the itsy, bitsy, 20-something assistant I asked for help with regard to sizing was wearing the same firm control waist cincher I was looking at underneath her uniform. It wasn't that she needed to look any slimmer than she already was, she explained, it was just that her clothes seemed to fit more comfortably if she had shapewear underneath.

'You should buy one size bigger than you usually do, or you'll never get them on,' she warned me. As with any other knickers one might buy out of M&S, you weren't allowed to try them on in the shop, nor could you return them in the event they didn't fit once you got them home. And did I mention that they cost over S$100 a pair? Not the sort of thing you want to end up pushing to the back of the underwear draw and never ever wearing!

More items from my real life wardrobe

Back to what caused me to be late for my lunch appointment. I had just bought a firm control body (4th from the left) last week, and was expecting it to provide a nice, firm foundation for the dress on the left, yet another M&S favourite, purchased here in Singapore during one or other of the sales way back in 2013. (I remember because I was endeavouring to perform the role of trainee teacher with Singapore's Ministry of Education at that time and, if I'm realio trulio honest about it, I reckon having a wardrobe full of comfortable, figure-flattering M&S frocks was one of the things that kept me going for as long as I did.) The probably with this particular dress is that the fabric isn't just a lighter colour than the other dress on this page; it's considerably lighter in weight and therefore just a tiny bit see-through. As soon as I slipped the dress on, I realised I'd be needing to buy a nude coloured one to go with the black one I'd just spent a good ten minutes struggling to do up at the back. Off with that dress and on with a different one then, except that I couldn't find either of the pairs of shoes shown here, and ended up having to wear a pair I prefer to only wear with trousers or longer skirts.

Do I really look as nice as I feel in either of these dresses? I don't know, but I have caught myself admiring how well M&S figure-flattering dresses suit other women, be they older or younger or more or less exactly the same age as I am. I might try to get a few pictures taken the next time I'm wearing one and let the world decide. Meanwhile, here's my pick of this season's dresses, none of which I'm likely to be buying as I'm not working at the moment and therefore don't have much of an excuse right. I will definitely be stocking up on magic undies during my next visit home, however, not least because, the older the dress, the more important the foundation, in my experience.

Which would you buy and where would you hope to wear it? (N.B. Singapore teachers aren't supposed to wear anything sleeveless, meaning three of these dresses might be interpretted to be breaking the rules.)